Late goal lifts Wild over Flyers

PHILADELPHIA - Kicking trash cans, slamming doors, screaming at players that they’re “embarrassing,” mild-mannered Chuck Fletcher would probably never do what Philadelphia Flyers counterpart Ron Hextall reportedly did Wednesday night at Madison Square Garden.
“I usually let the coaches do that,” Fletcher, the Minnesota Wild GM, joked from the Wells Fargo Arena press box between periods Thursday - a night after Hextall apparently lit into his struggling Flyers bunch after an awful effort during a third straight loss at the Rangers.
Maybe Wild coach Mike Yeo pulled a Hextall during the second intermission Thursday, but whatever the reason, the Wild played a much cleaner game with the puck and paid Darcy Kuemper back for a brilliant goaltending performance during a 3-2 nailbiter of an NHL victory to extend their win streak to four games.
Jason Zucker, who
hadn’t scored a goal in the previous 10 games or a point in the previous eight, scored the winning goal with 45.4 seconds left on a setup from Ryan Suter.
The goal answered Claude Giroux’s tying goal with 3½ left.
Despite turnovers galore from his teammates in the first 40 minutes, Kuemper made a season-high 37 saves to open a three-game road trip. Nino Niederreiter also scored a goal and had an assist, and Marco Scandella had a goal.